Bruce Mason

Hypermedia and Ethnography: Reflections on the Construction of a Research Approach

Current interest in ethnography within social research has focused on its potential to offer insights into the complexity of the social world. There have increasingly been calls for ethnography to reflect this complexity more adequately. Two aspects of ethnographic enquiry have been particularly singled out as areas in need of redefinition: the delineation of ethnographys object of study and its mode of presentation. Both of these areas are implicated in the recent attention to the possibilities of hypermedia authoring for ethnography. The paper offers a discussion of this potential in the light of an ongoing research project with which the authors are engaged. The project is designed to enable this potential to be assessed, and to provide for the construction of what the authors call an ethnographic hypermedia environment (EHE). We believe that the promise of hypermedia lies not only in its facility for non-sequential data organisation, but also in its ability to integrate data in different media. The synthesis of the visual, aural, verbal and pictorial planes of meaning holds considerable promise for the expansion and deepening of ethnographic knowledge. Consequently, we suggest that hypermedia has implications for all stages of the research process, and argue against the current tendency to see it as merely a tool either for analysis or for presentation. These arguments are illustrated by means of a commentary on some work in progress.

Hypermedia ethnography in educational settings: possibilities and challenges

This paper considers some of the methodological implications of undertaking and representing multimedia and digital, ethnographic work. It explores some of the challenges and opportunities of working with and across a range of media, and explores some of the consequences of bringing hypermedia applications to ethnographic work. The paper draws on a project that sought to explore the learning opportunities and experiences of an interactive science discovery centre, and that utilised a multimedia, ethnographic approach. The paper locates this methodological approach alongside recent and ongoing developments within qualitative research, and aims to situate educational research within the context of these developments. The paper particularly addresses issues of integrating different forms of qualitative data, ethnographic ‘design’, the ethics of research practice, communication and capacity building.

Going Beyond the Code: The Production of Hypermedia Ethnography

New developments in multimedia and hypermedia technology have raised important questions for the conduct and dissemination of sociological research. Attention has traditionally focused on uses of new media for teaching, but their application to research is now also becoming clearer. There has been particular interest—although little practical work so far—on how ethnographers might use hypermedia in planning, design, analysis, and presentation of ethnographic work. This article offers findings from the authors’ current ESRC project, which examines the appropriateness of hypermedia for the production of ethnography. The theoretical and methodological implications for sociological knowledge of this new technology are discussed. The authors also address arguments about the potential for transforming the production of sociological knowledge through granting equal weight to the audio-visual plane of meaning as that given to the verbal and situate their discussion within debates over new forms of reading and authoring offered to sociology through electronic media.